Trudge trudge trudge
Today's post has been brought to you by a lot of walking around. The meet was smaller than expected, but quite nice. Started at the Panton where "I have never" was played. I'm quite glad for my ability to sip shots at this point. Thence to the Saffron where the food was, as always, sublime. Then to Rosie's where we drank Lingonberry liqueur provided by st_lemur. Very good stuff. Then Saturday entailed a bit of faffing around, noodles from the noodle stand in the market (accompanied by the noise of yet another demonstration), the (eventual) arrival of dave_t_lurker, and punting. After the punting (and hurrah, almost everyone tried (except Rosie)) we went and sat in the Eagle for a bit, and while there acquired a Raj (who used to live in Palm Springs and is now studying in Germany^WPortsmouth, and whom I'd not seen in 3 1/2 years, and who has the dubious distinction of having been friends with both Ben and me before we actually got together). Thence to the Fitz to look at my favourite painting there (a self-portrait of George Richmond ca. 1820 I think - him aged about 30 at any rate). Ben claims it doesn't look so much like him really, and that the nose is all wrong. Pah. I think my thought processes went something like this: "Oooh, lovely painting. What a pretty mouth, what a sweet expression. Nice. Oh. It reminds me of Ben. Gotcha." It's the expression and the colouring, I think, more than the actual features. But I digress. Anyway, we only stayed about 5 or 10 minutes at the Fitz because we got there just before closing time, so then we went to Waterstone's and I was very good and didn't buy any books. Oh, and I dragged Ben out to get him a Panama hat as an anniversary present. It suits him exceedingly well, and I must try to get a good photo of him wearing it. Anyway, after sitting around in Waterstone's for a while, we set off for the Sala Thong, who have an early dinner special (£8 or so for stir fry veg, choice of curry, and dessert), as recommended by Rosie. Then to Rosie's, where there was a games evening going on. Nick (nice easily-frightened chap mentioned here and here) was there, which was nice, as I wasn't certain he was still about since he was a third-year last year (though I reckoned he was as he's a fizz natsci and they tend to stay on for a fourth year). Um, that made sense to me at least. Oh, and only one person (a chap called Tom) was gallant enough to walk with me to the Co-op to get some orange juice. I say, young people today... ;-) So yes, anyway. People played games, and I was too knackered to even kibitz as I usually do (I'm terrible at games so I prefer to watch), but singing happened in the corridor, including attempts at harmonising the Quartermaster's Store song on the guitar. Then home, where Raj, Edmund and Maaike crashed over with us. I just saw Raj off a little while ago as he had to go off to some wedding rehearsal of his family's. So yes, that has been the weekend so far. Today, I'm going off to London to see Scholl sing Saul (again, having done so at the Barbican sometime last year) at the Proms. I think we may go out to Grantchester Meadows tomorrow. Gosh, this has been a bit of a long journal entry.